Panettones

Panettones are not easily available unless it's near the x'mas season. Not only that, it's rather expensive.

As usual, this bread had been on my to-do list for sometime and I've never got around to try it. I've mentioned before that I've not been a fan of dried fruits, such as raisins and cherries, but the rest of the family loves it. Before cny, I soaked some fruits in rum and since then it's still sitting in the container waiting to be used. I was planning to bake another light fruit cake as it was well-received by the family. But then I suddenly recalled that the fruits can also be used in panettones! So I looked thru' my stash of recipe books and Elyn alerted me to a panettone recipe in Alex Goh's Bread book. Sweet Elyn even offered to type out the recipe and send it to me... and blur me, upon reaching home that nite, then realised that I do have that book at home! I had planned to look thru' the internet for a panettone recipe, and I did that, only to realise that most of the recipes called for a number of eggs. However, Alex's Goh's panettone recipe only required 1 egg... so of course I opted for the "healthier" version.

The recipe used the sponge method, which I had attempted before. The dough was rather difficult to handle as it was really soft and sticky. And true to it's description in the book, the finished bread is really light and soft. However, it can only yield 9 pcs of muffin-sized panettones. I decided to use rectangular paper liners which DH bought for me on his recent trip to China. It's bigger than the regular muffin cups so I had to estimate the amt of dough to fit the liner. Well, it turned out too little. The bread only raised up to 3/4 of the liner, and I only got 7 pcs of panettones. Also, I did not place the muffins liners in a tin, so I ended up with odd-shaped liners after the poofing!


If I were to make this bread using the same recipe next time, I'll probably double it. Also, now I understand why it's so at such a high price.... there's rum-soaked fruits and rum in it. However, commercially sold panettones tasted so dry and there's preservatives in it. And well, who knows if they used the sponge method of bread making?
PS : For those who are looking to buy a breadmaker, Carrefour had launched a new model of their in-house brand, Bluesky. It's retailing at $69.90. I just went to buy myself one! *happy dance*